Unidentified individuals spray-painted swastikas on a synagogue in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, over the weekend, a former leader of the country’s Jewish community told JNS.
Police have no suspects in custody in connection with the incident, Alexander Oscar, the former president of the Organization of the Jews in Bulgaria “Shalom,” told JNS.
Antisemitic incidents are rare in Bulgaria, which had roughly 2,000 people who identified as Jewish in 2020, according to a report published that year.
The Zion Synagogue of Plovdiv was built in the 19th century atop the foundations of an earlier synagogue, constructed in 1711. The interior features an intricate wooden Torah ark and frescoes restored in the 2000s with donations from the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of American Heritage Abroad.
The ruins of a far earlier synagogue, dating back to the late 3rd century CE, were discovered in Plovdiv in the 1980s, during the construction of a block of flats. Its mosaics were moved to the local archaeology museum.
When that synagogue was constructed, Plovdiv was known as Philippopolis—a major city and trading center on the route that connected Constantinople with Europe.
